She gave me a kiss a few days ago -- quite deliberately planted it on my tummy. And then yesterday she gave me another -- right on the cheek.
The orphanage ladies are trying to teach her what it means to have a "Mama and Papa," and how you should treat them when you see them. Just before she runs over to great us, they harangue her with a lot of instructions. Once we asked our facilitator what they were saying, and she said they were telling her that when she sees her mama and papa she should go up and greet them and give them a hug and say hello. Anatolia is very serious as she listens to their instructions and she nods and nods and says, "Da. Da."
And then she runs to us, all smiles and laughter.
I wonder how much she understands about how completely her life is about to change. She has lived at this orphanage since she was 6 months old. It is all she knows. This is one of the best orphanages in the area, if not in the whole country, and so it has been a tremendous blessing. Her "mamas" have been the many ladies attending there. Only once or twice have any outside "mamas and papas" come to visit her, and then only briefly. We have now been visiting for 7 or 8 days running.
A few days ago we were looking at the book of our life in Texas, and I showed her the picture of the room she will share with Emma. I pointed to the bottom bunk and said, in badly pronounced Russian, "This is your bed." She said, "No, my bed is with my groupa." I tried it again, but she was sure I was wrong. How can we prepare her for what is coming? The joys of it are all wrapped up in the losses.
But change was on it's way already, whether she realized it or not. Her orphanage is a "baby house" and only intended for children up to age 5 or 6. She turned 5 in February, so her moving-out clock was already ticking. We have come for her at a perfect time, because the change to a new orphanage might not have landed her in such a warm and loving space.
Our driver comes each day for us at 4pm. (Having a driver sounds like a luxury, until you spend some time riding around in a car here. Drivers seem to follow only one unspoken rule: if it gets me where I want to go in the fastest way possible, it is good driving. People think nothing of swerving around others in their way, even if it means driving for a while in the lanes of oncoming traffic. Lanes are either non-existent, or only followed as "suggestions," and if there is space for another car, whether the lane indicates it or not, another car will squeeze in. We are grateful not to be navigating the roads here! We pay about 350 hryvnia per orphanage visit, and our driver waits for us while we are in with Anatolia. With the current unbalanced exchange rate it comes out to about $17.50 in USA money and is ridiculously little to pay for the service.)
It takes us about 30 minutes to get to the orphanage, so we arrive at 4:30. We stand outside the gate and buzz in. Someone answers us on the intercom and the gate clicks open. We hand in our "calling card" that has our names and Anatolia's on it, and then we sit on a bench in the gardens and wait.
Anatolia's group of other 5 year olds, about 12 - 15 of them, comes out to play each day a little after 4:30. When Anatolia sees us sitting there, she starts to wiggle and dance and can't wait to get down the short flight of steps to see us! But the steps are tricky, so she pays attention and holds someone's hand as she descends. Then the orphanage worker seems to tell her half a dozen things and finally she is running towards us, all smiles and full of joy.
I wonder sometimes -- is she happy because we are here with fun games and toys and willing to give her our undivided attention, or does she understand what our coming means? I imagine this is something new for her. Even with the very generous ratio of workers to children that seems to be the norm at her orphanage, she can't have had too many experiences where two people, solely intent on loving her, were there to giver her their full love and care for 90 minutes of play each day. But we are praying that our loving Father in Heaven will prepare her mind to understand the new paradigm of "family" that we are bringing to her.
Language is a barrier, although we have been able to figure out most of what we need to communicate in our play. We play in the sandbox, slide down the slides, swing, kick a ball around, and play on the merry-go-round, pictured below. It has four arms that pivot around a central hub. Each arm has two seats attached to it, facing away from each other. She likes to sit on one and push with her feet so she is cycling backwards or to just push the whole thing around in circles. More often than not, she has specific seats she wants us to sit in (in Ben's case, crouch down in, because he doesn't quite fit) and then we all nudge it around in circles with our feet. Playing on the merry-go-round makes her laugh, particularly as we catch a moment to sneak in a tickle.
While we play she tells us many things, but when we start to do what we think she is asking us we often hear, "Nyet! Nyet!" which is the Russian "No! No!" She must think we are daft! ;)
Yesterday I wanted to explore the idea of bed again, so while she was taking a break from jumping on the little trampoline, I said to her again in Russian, "this is your bed." She caught on right away, and laid down and pretended to sleep and then to pop up, awake, as a fun game. I was glad to see that pretend was a part of her experience, and that if she couldn't stretch it so far as to imagine that her bed was the one in the book, she could pretend it was on the trampoline.
When it is time to go, we tell her "Poka, poka!" (bye-bye) and lead her back to her group. She gives us a final hug and then we head for the gate. Sometimes she will come running after us with an additional hug, and even a kiss, and then she goes back to her group to resume her play with them. The other children want to wave and tell us goodbye as well.
Thirty minutes more and we are home to our apartment in the middle of the city, a place hopping with people out for an evening on the town -- shopping, outdoor cafes, street musicians, pony rides, and even table after table of chess in the park.
(future reminder: tell about reading stories, the slinky, the tupperware container, and living here)
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